NEW DELHI: Weeks after the government referred the contentious Foreign Contribution (Regulation) Amendment Bill, 2026, to a Joint Parliamentary Committee (JPC), a 31-member panel was constituted on Thursday, with BJP's Sanjay Jaiswal named as its chairperson.
On August 12, both Houses of Parliament adopted motions to refer the Bill to a JPC, even as Opposition parties maintained that the proposed legislation targets minorities and NGOs and demanded that it be withdrawn altogether. The government had rejected the charge, challenging the Opposition to identify any provision that discriminates against minorities.
The panel, constituted by Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla, has 14 members from the BJP and five from Congress. It also has two members each from JD(U), TMC and DMK, and one member each from SP, IUML, Shiv Sena, NCP (SP), NCP and TDP.
While BJP's Jaiswal is the chairperson, Bhartruhari Mahtab, Tejasvi Surya, Kamlesh Jangde, Mukeshkumar Chandrakaant Dalal, Nishikant Dubey, Vishnu Dayal Ram, Ananta Nayak and Arvind Dharmapuri are the members from the ruling party in the Lok Sabha.
Congress' Lok Sabha members who are part of the panel include Anto Antony, Captain Viriato Fernandes, Muhammed Hamdullah Sayeed and Kali Charan Munda.
Zia Ur Rehman (SP), Kalyan Banerjee (TMC), A Raja (DMK), Lavu Sri Krishna Devarayalu (TDP), Naresh Ganpat Mhaske (Shiv Sena), Kaushalendra Kumar (JD-U), Supriya Sule (NCP-SP) and ET Mohammed Basheer (IUML) are other members of the panel from the Lok Sabha.
From the Rajya Sabha, the BJP's C Sadanandan Master, Harsh Vardhan Shringla, Ujjwal Deorao Nikam, Alka Gurjar and Sat Paul Sharma are members of the panel.
Praful Patel (NCP), Sanjay Kumar Jha (JD-U), Christopher Manickam (Congress), Menaka Guruswamy (TMC) and P Wilson (DMK) are the other members of the panel from the Rajya Sabha.
The committee has been asked to submit its report to the Lok Sabha by the last day of the first week of the Winter session of Parliament.
The Bill, introduced in the Lok Sabha on March 25, proposes tighter oversight of NGOs and foreign contributions. The government had put it on hold following strong resistance from various stakeholders.
Among the contentious provisions is a proposal to create a designated authority to manage and dispose of assets when an organisation's FCRA registration is cancelled, surrendered or ceases to exist.
The Bill had also invited protests from several northeastern states. Nagaland Chief Minister Neiphiu Rio and Mizoram Chief Minister Lalduhoma had urged the Centre to send it to a parliamentary committee, while Meghalaya Chief Minister Conrad K Sangma had raised concerns over its provisions.